California regulators block AT&T from disconnecting landline service

The California Public Utilities Commission has denied AT&T’s request to stop providing landlines and other services in areas where there are no other options.

Its 4-0 vote Thursday came after a judge determined that AT&T California’s request was “fatally flawed.”

AT&T is the “carrier of last resort” for California, an official designation that means it covers most major cities, rural communities and the lands of more than 100 tribal governments. To find out if your home is in this area, visit this website. The commission first labeled AT&T a carrier of last resort nearly three decades ago.

More than a dozen speakers during the public comment period at Thursday’s meeting supported maintaining AT&T’s carrier of last resort designation and landlines. Previously, more than 5,000 public comments were made in response to AT&T’s application and nearly 6,000 people attended eight public forums held earlier this year.

Many commenters said that due to inconsistent cell coverage in their area, their landline is their primary means of communicating with family, medical providers, and the outside world in an emergency. These concerns are particularly important for older adults, people with disabilities, and people who say they are sensitive to electromagnetic activity.

AT&T argued that people now served by its landlines in the areas in question can switch to voice-over-Internet services offered by cable companies or to cell phone services offered by wireless service providers like Verizon.

Steve Hogle lives in rural Sonoma County and told the commission that spotty cell coverage posed a danger to his family during the 2019 Kincade wildfire.

“Had we not had a copper landline, we would not have known about the evacuation and the extremely serious fire that ravaged here and most of our properties,” he said . “I don’t want (voice over Internet service) because if there’s no electricity, there’s no Internet, and all of these things are extremely important for security of this community.”

The company has tried to end carrier designation of last resort requirements in about half of U.S. states, but those efforts don’t always stay within the law, according to federal prosecutors. In 2022, AT&T Illinois agreed to pay a $23 million fine to resolve accusations that it attempted to influence former Illinois House Speaker Mike Madigan.

The commission’s decision does not end debates over the carrier of last resort in California. AT&T and about a dozen members of the California Legislature have publicly expressed support for Assembly Bill 2797, which would effectively end certain carrier of last resort obligations. The California State Association of Counties, Representatives of California’s Rural Counties and California’s Urban Counties said last week that they opposed the billadding in a letter to the bill’s author that it “would leave a large portion of the most vulnerable Californians without reliable and affordable access to basic telephone service.”

The Public Utilities Commission also voted 5-0 Thursday to begin proceedings to change the rules for companies designated as a carrier of last resort. It’s time to modernize these rules, said commission chairwoman Alice Reynolds, because a lot has changed over the past 30 years, including the move toward cellphones and the move away from landlines, and that is now part of the commission’s mandate to make high-speed Internet access faster. universally available.

“I hope that through these new regulations, we can really modernize these programs and move forward into the future to achieve our goals for broadband for all,” she said before the vote.

CalMatters is a public interest journalism company dedicated to explaining how the California State Capitol works and why it matters.